Southampton have reached 25 games under Tonda Eckert’s management since the German stepped up to the role of senior head coach in December 2025.
It’s safe to say the Championship’s youngest boss has had a fantastic start, and no manager in Saints history who managed 20+ games has achieved as many points per game as him.
Following a last-gasp win in the FA Cup at Premier League Fulham, Eckert has reached 25 games in charge. Fifteen wins and 50 goals are impressive numbers: have Saints finally found their man?
Southampton’s hit rate under ownership group Sport Republic has been pretty diabolical.
Five permanent managerial appointments in the three years between Ralph Hassenhuttl and Tonda Eckert separate a sizeable difference in club reputation then and now. Eckert is working on rebuilding that.
Failure across the board from the owners has finally been met with some realisation that success starts from the top, not the manager at the helm.
Sporting Director Johannes Spors has done a fairly decent job so far. While he got the appointment of Will Still wrong at the start of the campaign, his work to build a fresh team fighting it out for play-off places in just two transfer windows has been impressive.
And Spors was the man who thought ahead, bringing Tonda Eckert to the U21s in the summer of 2025, seeing him as the future first team manager and successor to Still at the time.
Sport Republic will know there is still work to be done, and Spors leaving could bring the house of cards tumbling down. But for now, things are somewhat stable.
And there’s nobody to credit for this more than Eckert himself.
Considering Tonda Eckert is just 33 years of age and still navigating his first senior tenure as a football manager in one of the world’s toughest divisions, he is doing a pretty stellar job.
An interim period that saw Saints rise into play-off contention in December, with 6 wins in 7 games, he was handed an 18-month deal.
Questions were asked when Southampton then went seven games without a win, including a miserable 4-0 loss at the hands of Kim Hellberg’s Middlesbrough. But the response since has been better than the original honeymoon run.
Ten games winless, and one place off the play-offs, in a new system that has made the team more solid defensively, and one win away from a Wembley return for the FA Cup semi-finals.
But it’s not all down to tactics. Eckert has galvanised a group that had the fanbase on their backs, and deservedly so.
Will Still was not the man to lead the Saints’ rebuild. Out of his depth and ineffective, he left the club in a relegation scrap. Eckert has picked up the remnants while having to learn on the job, and has proved what an excellent footballing mind he has.
Eckert is improving day by day, as you’d expect from somebody in their first-ever senior role.
Until trying his hand as an assistant manager, the German was an analyst, and is showing the skills learnt from this background in his time as Saints boss.
Generally, Eckert’s side has been better in the first halves of games, before tailing off. This is a credit to the way he has tweaked his tactical setups to suit the team they’re playing against.
But this also highlights where improvement has been made, and needs to continue – in in-game management. While getting the recipe right is a great start, the team has often struggled to maintain their levels throughout the ninety.
Since changing to a back four and opting for a man-to-man approach, Saints have sustained this level for longer periods.
Eckert’s attention to detail is also excellent, and he visited Craven Cottage on the first Sunday of March to get a feel for Marco Silva’s side. Getting the little things right is important in such a long season as the Championship is.
And his media approach has always been cool and collected. No outbursts or over-the-top moments, exactly the kind of figurehead the club needs.
The Saints will face one of Port Vale, Leeds United, Manchester City, Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea or Brentford/West Ham in the FA Cup quarter-finals, where they are just one more good 90-minute performance away from Wembley.
Eckert’s army will be hoping to grab one of the Championship play-off places too, as they continue to climb the table.
Things are far from perfect, but they are looking up for Southampton.
50 years on from their last FA Cup win, when they won it despite being a second division side, they’ll be hoping to go and do it all over again.
